If you’re a rising senior feeling anxious about having to juggle school, extracurriculars, and college applications this fall, you may be wondering what you can do to get started during June and July so you feel less stressed and overwhelmed in the coming months.
While most schools don’t update their supplemental essays and school-specific questions until August 1st, you can definitely start filling out information about yourself, your family, and your activities over the summer.
What’s on the Common App?
- Profile – your personal information like name, date of birth, contact info
- Family – your parent or guardian’s contact information and educational history, and a list of any siblings
- Education – where you’ve gone to school, your grades, most recent courses, and honors
- Testing – standardized test scores you want to report
- Activities – brief (150-character) descriptions of your extracurricular activities
- Personal Essay – up to 650 words to give colleges a better sense of who you are. Prompts are provided, including a “topic of your choice.” Don’t rush your Common App essay—take your time to work on writing and editing it. But the summer can definitely be the time to start thinking about what you want your essay to focus on and get started on early drafts.
- Additional Information – an optional section usually used to explain something significant that isn’t addressed in other parts of your application, such as non-traditional grading systems, a sudden drop in grades, or any responsibilities, physical, or mental health conditions that may have impacted you.
- “Challenges and circumstances” question – an optional short essay that was introduced during the 2025-26 application cycle where students who were significantly impacted by the factors such as discrimination, family disruptions, physical health or mental well-being can share extraordinary challenges they faced. Most students likely should not fill out this section. Use our guide to figure out if this question is for you.
How Should You Get Started on the Common App This Summer?
Start with the basics—create an account! Go to commonapp.org and click “Start your application” to set up your login information. Be sure to use the email address where you want to receive correspondence from colleges, including updates on missing materials and admissions decisions. Some students create a new email address just for this purpose.
Start with the straightforward sections, like your personal information, education history, etc. This might not seem as crucial as writing your personal essay, but you can’t submit applications without it. The last thing you want is to forget about these sections until you have to rush to complete them for your first deadline.
It’s also important to keep careful track of deadlines and extra materials required by each school. Set up a spreadsheet or calendar to plan out when you will complete each application, including steps like requesting test scores and transcripts and completing supplemental essays. It’s a good idea to get the main essay finished early so you can move onto supplements and complete them as individual deadlines come up. Even better, set up a summer schedule for tackling applications so that you have everything finished by the time your first deadline rolls around!
The Activities Section
Once you’ve set up your Common App account and gotten organized, a great first project is the Activities section. This is where you’ll list your extracurricular activities. Some activities, like music, theater, athletics, or academic competitions, will come to mind right away. Others might not be so obvious, but can reveal a lot about you, like taking on a recurring responsibility in your family such as babysitting a sibling or serving as a translator. You’ll notice that the Common App provides a dropdown menu for each activity type. You can use that to help jog your memory about what you’re involved in. It’s also worth having a family member look over your list to make sure you haven’t missed anything.
Once you’ve brainstormed your list, you can start on the Common App Activities section – even if you’re still unsure of what you’ll be doing in your senior year. Fill out what you can to get a head start, and make a note to come back to it later. You’ll be asked to list your title or position (50 characters) and to describe each activity in 150 characters. To make the most of your Activities section, consider these quick tips:
- List your activities in order of their importance to you.
- Don’t just describe the activity or organization; describe your role within it.
- Highlight leadership, commitment, and accomplishment.
- You don’t need to use complete sentences.
You can read more about filling out the activities list on our blog here.
Honors section
The honors section allows you to report impressive awards and accomplishments from the past four years. Alongside the activities list, adding your honors can help admissions officers understand your prowess in different fields inside and outside the classroom.
You’ll have 100 characters to describe each honor/award in as much detail as possible. Use this space wisely. Not all admissions officers will be familiar with all acronyms, especially if it’s a niche school award. So, use the character count to go into as much detail as possible with what you mention.
You’re also allowed up to five honors total. So, you should list your most impressive awards and group any similar types of awards together.
Additional Information
The Additional Information section is an optional part of the Common Application usually used to explain something significant that isn’t addressed in other parts of your application.
Think of the Additional Information section as a place for information that the Common App doesn’t have a designated section for. If you’ve been meaningfully involved in significant activities beyond the ten that fit in your Activities List, this section is the place to mention those. The same is true if you’ve taken part in things like research projects or competitions that don’t fit into the Activities Section formatting. Other information for this section might include non-traditional grading systems, explanation of a sudden drop in grades, or any responsibilities or health issues that may have impacted you.
As you enter the information into the Common App, be sure to proofread! Make sure that you have the numbers in your address right and that activity descriptions capture your impact accurately. Filling out the Common App can be time-consuming, so if you complete these sections in the summer, future-you will be grateful in the fall.
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